To many people today, the church in the West — and especially in the United States — isn’t working. Whether it’s declining attendance, a society losing interest in Christianity altogether, or an American way of life that seems increasingly post-Christian, something seems wrong. The book of Revelation names this condition in its letter to the Laodiceans: lukewarm. That letter frames Jesus’ call to the church in a way that leaves room for personal response, and it’s where much of my own searching began.
Over time, I moved through various churches and denominations, read widely, and listened to theologians and religious leaders across the spectrum. But the fundamental issues remained frustratingly vague — so I found myself returning, again and again, to Scripture itself. Slowly, patterns began to emerge that I hadn’t encountered elsewhere, and I started exploring what it might look like to actually walk them out.
It began with Jesus’ own summary of Scripture — loving God and neighbor — and the three-fold way He lived it out: ministering to people, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and teaching others. That became a foundation to build from.
Then came events that widened the picture considerably. A global pandemic and a dramatic shift in American politics placed new stresses on the church, and its response to both was strikingly different from what I’d have expected given Scripture, the early church, and historical precedent. Those reactions revealed some important things about the sources of today’s lukewarmness.
What I’ve come to see is that Revelation speaks directly to this moment. It describes the relationship between empire and church with remarkable clarity — how empires become problematic, how Christians are called to live in an unchristian world, how the church should respond to political power, and what’s at stake when it doesn’t. The forces at work today aren’t new.
But Revelation’s other message is hope — an eternal hope with present-tense weight. Even when empires go wrong and pull churches along with them, the possibility of redemption remains: a return to the original direction Jesus gave us.
This blog is where I’m working these things out in public — exploring what Scripture reveals about the relationship between empire and kingdom, the nature of today’s lukewarmness, what faithful witness looks like now, and where hope can still be found.
Exploring Antioch 